Vytautas Kiejstutowicz, godfather name Alexander (formerly Catholic Wigand), born 1354 or 1355 in Trakai (?), died. October 27, 1430 in Trakai) - Lithuanian prince from the family of Gediminovich, in 1384-1389 prince of Grodno, Brest, Sura, Drohiczyn, Volkovysk, Kamenets, in 1392-1401 governor of Lithuania, from 1401 Grand Duke of Lithuania (Magnus Dux), son of Kiejstut and priestess Biruta, cousin of King Wladyslaw II Jagiello. He took part in battles against Moscow, the Golden Horde and the Teutonic Knights, as well as in the struggle for dominion in Lithuania. His policy, both as governor of Lithuania and as Grand Duke, of consolidating Lithuania as an independent and strong state was at odds with that of his cousin, King Wladyslaw Jagiello of Poland, who intended to make Lithuania a "Polish province." In Jan Długosz's chronicle, the picture of Vytautas is remarkably positive, and he is also called pater patriae of Lithuania by the chronicler. source: wikipedia.com
,,STORIA DELLA POLONIA" BY BERNARD ZAYDLER - HISTORY OF POLAND IN PICTURES TOLD TO ITALY.The title of the work Storia della Polonia fino agli ultimi tempi scritta dal dottore Bernardo Zaydler Polacco membro della Regia Società degli Amici delle Scienze in Warsavia, e di pare-cchie accademie letterarie italiane can be translated as "History of Poland until the last times written by Dr. Bernard Zaydler, a Pole, member of the Royal Society of Friends of Science in Warsaw and similar literary academies in Italy." It was published in the Florentine outhouse V. Batelli e Figli, in 1831, that is, during the November Uprising, when the Polish-Russian war was taking place on Polish soil. The "ultimi tempi" mentioned in the title, however, did not include the uprising, and the last chapter of the book was devoted to the flourishing Kingdom of Poland under Czar Nicholas I, whose portrait precedes the title page of the publication. The book consists of two volumes, the first of which has 440 pages and the second 720. The work is illustrated with 107 charts, created in intaglio by Florentine printmakers based on contemporary and ancient engravings. There are also two maps depicting the borders of Poland: pre-partition and from 1831.As Jadwiga Jaworska matter-of-factly describes the book's illustrations, they are "flimsy engravings made by mediocre engravers" . Most of their authors are known mainly from this very publication and only their names, often without first names, fixed in signatures under the compositions, have survived to our times. These included: Corsi , Verico , Adamo Bozza , Nasi, Cignozzi. Among the illustrators, the name of Francesco Pieraccini appears , about whom also little is known. Source: Kamilla Pijanowska, National Museum in Warsaw
